


Before Incorporeal

by TaraHarkon



Series: Incorporeal [3]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, College, First Meetings, M/M, Prequel, Prequel to the INAverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-02
Updated: 2018-09-02
Packaged: 2019-07-06 03:05:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15877194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TaraHarkon/pseuds/TaraHarkon
Summary: Before a ghost haunted a house on the outskirts of town, Edward met Barry.





	Before Incorporeal

Barry Bluejeans sat at the kitchen table and listened to the quiet chirps of the crickets outside. Go back to school, mein kleiner Bär, you always wanted to. Learn what you need to know to go to the stars. Those had been his mother’s last words to him before she had smiled and said her Gregor was here for her. A month later and with the house still more or less the way it had been, Barry sat with a cup of coffee beside him, the radio playing on the counter, and applications for graduate school spread out in front of him. He also had job applications, of course. He wasn’t going to be able to be a full-time student. He couldn’t afford that. But there was a research facility nearby that did work with NASA and he had the right background for a junior position. If he could swing it, that would make going back to school stressful on time but easy on the budget. It just meant he'd be going to a local school and that was alright. 

A few months later, he had a backpack slung over his shoulder as he walked onto campus for the first time.

Classes weren’t hard for him, something Barry appreciated intensely as he raced back and forth between classes, work, and home. There was talk of forming a new calculator division soon and, assuming he kept up this pace, it would be just after he’d gotten his masters. Perfect. Yeah, he’d be the junior member of the team, but he’d be doing the important work at long last.

He was crossing campus, fiddling compulsively with a slide rule in one hand, when a force suddenly slammed into him. He looked down to see a young elven boy with a football in his hands. His ears flicked up in surprise and then down into a more neutral position.

“Sorry, Mister.”

Barry blinked, surprised, and then he smiled.

“No, no, it’s okay. No harm done. You okay, bud?”

The boy nodded and Barry looked him over. He was wearing shorts and a striped shirt and his hair was long, tied back in a ponytail. A moment later, an older elven man approached with a tight smile on his face. He relaxed when he spotted them.

“Keats, what did I tell you about running off?”

The boy’s ears drooped and his shoulders slumped.

“Not to... Sorry, Eddie. But-"

“I apologize for my brother.” The man held a hand out and Barry took it. “I’m Edward and this is Keats.”

“I’m Barry. Barry Bluejeans.”

Barry noted the huge stack of bound folders that Edward was carrying at the same time Edward noted Barry’s stack of books"

“You’re not a student, surely.”

Barry laughed a little nervously.

“I am, actually. Grad school. I uh... I took a break between.”

Edward laughed and adjusted his stack of things, a contemplative look on his face.

“You had me rethinking my understanding of human ages, Barry. Not that I’m saying you’re old, but you’re certainly not one of these eighteen-year-old nuisances I’ve been doing lectures for.”

Barry grinned at that. Then he looked Edward over curiously. He was a handsome man, lithe and tall with pointed ears that stayed in a fairly neutral position even as they chatted. His hair was dark like the boy’s but cut short and perfectly styled. He was in a suit and Barry felt his stomach do a little nervous flip-flop. People in suits were his one weakness in this world. The only thing worse was those little shorts everyone had been wearing when he was a teenager.

After a moment, Edward's eyebrows knit together and he looked Barry over again.

"Did you say Barry  _ Bluejeans _ ?" Then, before Barry could do more than open his mouth to try and stumble through an explanation, Edward continued on. "Because I'm fairly certain I just read the resume of a Barry Bluejeans looking to come work on my team with my sister and I... And you said you're a grad student, so I think that lines up. Looking to get into rocketry, Barry Bluejeans?"

Barry nodded a little, a blush creeping across his cheeks as Edward looked him over contemplatively.

"Uh yeah... Spaceflight is... it's something I really care about. Getting to the moon, the science and all that. I mean, beating the Reds there would sure be swell, but it's the science I care about."

Edward laughed and gave Barry a huge smile.

"You're not in an interview just yet, Bluejeans. But... Well, I think you can expect to hear about one soon. I can't wait to see what sort of work we can do together."

 


End file.
